ude, the sun! One
of these days when you have finished your books, I should like to
write one with you; my impressions of the desert as I rode from
oasis to oasis, seeking Tahar--"

"Who was he?"

"He was the man who had the eagles. Haven't I told you already how--?"

"Yes, yes, Asher, but tell me did you meet Tahar, and did you see
gazelles hunted?"

"Yes, and larger deer. My first idea was hawking and we went to a
lake. One of these days I must tell you about that lake, about its
wild fowl, about the buried city and the heron which was killed. We
found it among Roman inscriptions. But to tell of these things--my
goodness, Harding, it would take hours!"

"Don't try, Asher. Tell me about the gazelles."

"How we went from oasis to oasis in quest of this man who always
eluded us, meeting him at last in Beclere's oasis. But you haven't
heard about Beclere's, the proprietor, you might say, of one oasis;
he discovered a Roman well, and added thousands of acres; but if I
began to tell about Beclere's we should be here till midnight."

"I should like to hear about the gazelles first."

"I never knew you cared so much for sport, Harding; I thought you
would be more interested in the desert itself, and in Beclere's. It
spoils a story to cut it down to a mere sporting episode. There
doesn't seem to be anything to tell now except I tell it at length:
those great birds, nearly three feet high, with long heads like
javelins, and round, clear eyes, and lank bodies, feathered thighs,
and talons that find out instinctively the vital parts, the heart and
the liver; the bird moves up seeking these. And that is what is so
terrible, the cruel instinct which makes every life conditional on
another's death. We live upon dead things, cooked or uncooked."

"But how are these birds carried?"

"That is what I asked myself all the way across the desert. The hawks
are carried on the wrist, but a bird three feet high cannot be
carried on the wrist. The eagle is carried on the pummel of the
saddle."

"And how are the gazelles taken and the eagles recaptured?"

"They answer to the lure just like a hawk. The gazelles come down
into the desert after the rains to feed among the low bushes,
rosemary and lavender. In the plain, of course, they have no chance,
the bird overtakes them at once; fleet as they are, wings are
fleeter, and they are over-taken with incredible ease, the bird just
flutters after them. But the hunt is more interestin